Jury hears Porco's first words to cops

BRENDAN J. LYONS Senior writer

Published 1:00 am, Friday, June 30, 2006

GOSHEN -- Nearly a half hour after Christopher Porco had been told by a newspaper reporter that both his parents were dead, he called a police dispatcher in Bethlehem and tried to find out what had happened.

"My name is Chris Porco. I was just called by the Times Union saying my parents are dead," Porco told the dispatcher, his voice calm and steady. "I'm at school. ... They called and said my parents were found. ... They didn't say how or anything."

In fact, Porco's father, Peter, had been murdered, but his wife, Joan, had barely survived the vicious bludgeoning inside their Delmar home.

Porco, who is on trial for murder and attempted murder, was in his dorm room at the University of Rochester when the reporter, Simone Sebastian, called trying to reach one of his roommates for comment. Two hours earlier, police radio channels had begun issuing all-points bulletins calling Porco a suspect in the homicide, warning that he may be dangerous and providing a description of his yellow Jeep.

Instead of a roommate, though, the young reporter was shocked when Porco answered.

"Yes, I have parents," Porco told Sebastian, according to her notes. "What happened?"

The newspaper had reached Porco before police knew he was in Rochester.

Sebastian, a former Times Union staffer who had been working temporarily at the newspaper through a fellowship program, said she had made a mistake in telling him both his parents were deceased.

"I did feel bad about it afterwards," said Sebastian, who now works at the San Francisco Chronicle, in an interview late Thursday. "I was under the impression that both his parents had passed. ... I think that was my mistake."

Still, the subsequent call Porco made to Bethlehem police, one of two he made to the department that afternoon, was played in court Thursday as authorities tried to demonstrate for jurors that they believe his demeanor was abnormally calm. They also believe he had lied to police about the last time he visited his parents.

The tape was played at the end of the first day of testimony at the trial of Porco, 22, who is charged with murdering his father and attempting to murder his mother. The couple were beaten viciously with an ax as they slept in their Delmar home on Nov. 15, 2004.

Porco's attorney, Laurie Shanks, gave a blistering cross-examination of the dispatcher who took the call that day, Briana Tice, asking why she only took Porco's number and told him that someone would call him back.

"You put him on hold?" Shanks asked, contending that Porco was simply trying to find out whether the newspaper's call had been a terrible prank.

Tice said she got Porco's contact information, including his telephone number, and told him a detective would get back to him. She said she knew Porco was a suspect, but standard procedure dictates dispatchers not give out details in investigations to any caller.

Several minutes later, Detective Charles Rudolph used his cellphone to call Porco, telling him what had happened to his parents. That call was not taped. But as they talked, Rudolph realized he should be recording their call and asked Porco to call him back at the police station, where all lines are secretly taped, according to officials in the case.

Then, in his third conversation with police that afternoon, more than 75 minutes after his first conversation with the reporter, Porco called Rudolph back. He told the detective that his uncle in Rochester would be driving him to Albany and that he had e-mailed his parents recently about "college loans and stuff." Then he asked if Rudolph knew the condition of his mother.

"No," Rudolph said.

The dispatcher's testimony followed a day of unsettling testimony from four other witnesses: a state court officer who made the grisly discovery; a police officer who was one of the first people to respond to the call and found Joan Porco barely alive on her bed; and two paramedics who treated her.

During the testimony of one paramedic, Christopher Porco appeared to become emotional when a police photograph of his badly beaten mother was shown on a large screen in the courtroom. At a pre-trial hearing last month, Porco heard almost identical testimony from the same paramedics. He did not lose his composure then, although no photographs were shown at the earlier hearing.

The paramedics, Kevin Robert and Dennis Wood, both described in graphic detail the grave injuries to Joan Porco's head and face. They found her lying sideways across her blood-soaked bed, her face unrecognizable and a large ax sticking up from the sheets.

She was unable to talk because her jaw was split in half and resting on her chest; her forehead was split open and her brain visible, and her left eye was completely gone. She also had lacerations on her arm.

Despite the injuries, the paramedics said Joan Porco was able to communicate. As they pressed her on whether one of her sons was responsible, she nodded "yes" when asked if Christopher had done it, they said.

A test to measure her cognitive function determined she was unable to speak but aware of what was going on, according to Robert.

"She seemed to be following the commands I was giving her," he said.

Joan Porco's alleged identification of her younger son as the attacker is a critical component in the prosecution's case. The paramedics and police officers who were in the room at the time have given varying accounts of who asked her the questions, but all agree she was lucid and able to identify Christopher as her assailant.

Shanks queried the paramedics about their medical training, noting they are not doctors or neurologists. She also questioned whether Joan Porco was in any state to know what she was being asked, because she had possibly been there for hours, had lost much of her blood, suffered slight brain damage and was unable to speak.

"Did anyone ask if she loved her son, Christopher?" Shanks asked.

"No, ma'am," Robert responded.

Brendan J. Lyons can be reached at 454-5547 or by e-mail at blyons@timesunion.com.

WHAT'S NEXT: The Porco trial will resume Wednesday morning with more testimony.